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confession

Now I lay me down …

05 Saturday Sep 2015

Posted by morselsandscraps in confession

≈ 11 Comments

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night thoughts

When I'm relaxed, at home, alone, I like to spend that time before sleep comes, the last waking moments, stroking the day's memories till they purr. That's when I revisit all the little things that go to make up the pleasure of my days.

Discovering that my mother, gone for twenty years, liked to name trees and flowers in new places she visited.

Fencing myself in on my favourite lounge chair with all the assorted refugees from my study tidy-up.

Being the only person at the movies and having a National Theatre of London performance of Everyman to myself, after I'd booked a seat to beat the crowds.

Realising that I've forgotten how to make pastry because I haven't cooked a quiche for eight months.

Ruminating about the history of Fatima Island in the Cook's River.

Thinking about maps and what they include and what they leave out.

Revisualising images from the day's blogs: Jo's penguin balloons; Suzanne's whale; Sue's jaunty hat and bag on a chair; Jude's feast of roses; Paula's latest black and white masterpiece; the unexpectedness of creepy from Gilly; bees and the allotment from Tish; Pauline's archive that keeps turning up treasures.

Revising a haiku three or four times as my mind rolls over words and alternatives.

Stumbling across my daughter's wedding photos, and, on the same day, an account of her when she was about the age her twins are now.

Walking along the sandy track that took me not quite to the ocean, although I could occasionally glimpse its horizon line.

Spotting a bracken plant using an ant-lion mound for a vase.

As I lazily trawl through these delights a strange thing happens. Suddenly I'm outside myself, observing a woman walking along a bush track, or a beach, or a boardwalk, or sitting at the desk or on the lounge. I wonder idly how other people would see her, and realise that she is me.

 

Sometimes, the near sleep thoughts are less benign. Then I feel as if I'm stoking them till coals glow and ignite into flame. This is not nearly as comfortable: that's when I do a bit of accounting and worrying.

The deck and windows are grimy, and the lemon tree turning up its toes.

My son's face is swollen almost beyond recognition by a tick bite, and I stand by helpless: I don't even think of anti-histamines.

I'm contemplating hanging onto shares in a company investing billions in coal mining, because they give me a good return.

The house is chaotic: nothing is put away in its right place.

I spend far too much time blogging and navel-gazing, and far too little time walking or doing good works.

My grandchildren don't really remember me for anything in particular.

My country is mean-spirited and its politicians lack both intelligence and compassion.

By now, sleep has been shunted off down a side track, so I pick up my Kindle and read for a while to take myself into somebody else's world, away from the less pleasant aspects of my own.

 

Posted with BlogsyPosted with Blogsy

Frogs

22 Wednesday Oct 2014

Posted by morselsandscraps in confession

≈ 8 Comments

Tags

frogs, me painting

Dare I blog this? It's the kind of self-exposure I didn't expect a blog – or a friend – to demand of me. Yesterday, Loretta nudged me into painting rather than writing at Middle Earth, and she's hard to resist.

Before I knew where I was, a page had been sliced from my pad of canvasses, a sketch of a frog was plopped in front of me, I'd taken a sponge, dipped it in dobs of green and white acrylic, and created a background. Loretta whisked this away to dry and handed me a pencil. “Now, sketch a frog. Copy that one”, indicating a pencil sketch in a copy of Artist's palette. I shuddered and obeyed. My attempts were all out of proportion and the toes were pointy. So I practised frog toes all over my piece of paper, gradually getting them rounded, although padded was beyond my skill. Soon the page was filled with disembodied feet, and a congregation of distorted frog-bodies.

My splotchy background reappeared in front of me, accompanied by a piece of chalk. This was beginning to look like commitment. My job now was to transfer the pencil distortions onto the painted surface. Chalk is a forgiving medium and I was content with the blurry white outlines on green.

But my task mistress wasn't. “Now you paint them, Meg.” I tried not to see painting as colouring in and to remember to hold my fine paintbrush side on: a darker green first, a bit of white for frog-forehead and frog-mouth, red for frog-eyes. A pause, and then a fiddle with yellow for frog-bellies. My mentor's comment? “You can only get better”!

When I returned home the strain showed. I was garaging the car, singing inanely “I'm a frog! I'm a frog! I'm a frog!” when I realised my next door neighbour was on the other side of the bushes.

As I reflected on my day, I was glad I'd been given frog as a subject. Now I have frogs on canvas, and their image can't be “truthed” because I never see them, although they've been in full voice in puddles and creeks as I walk around after rain.

And that was my first attempt at painting on canvas with acrylic. I'll take three weeks off now, to gather strength for the next phase.

 

 

 

 

 

Posted with BlogsyPosted with Blogsy

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